LOOKING AT 100-200 AND 200-400 RATIOS

Speed Endurance vs. Special Endurance 1 VS. Special Endurance 2

By Bret Otte, Assistant Coach, Central Michigan University and Dave Hunt, Assistant Coach, University of Toronto

In the 1980's, Fred Dwyer, ex-Manhattan College coach, had an accomplished 4x400m relay team running at Boston University. Fred was too nervous to time, so I volunteered to take all the splits. Memory fails, but I believe the time was around 3:09 or so. This article reminded me of the little piece I wrote after the race comparing the 200 splits to the final time for each 400. Otte and Hunt go further and have some fun with the statistics. Maybe your 200-meter runner would do better at 400??

How fast must a
person run in the 100 meters to run a 20.20 200 meters? Is the 200m athlete
ready to move to the 400 meters? These are all questions I have heard myself and
other coaches ask, but have never been able to answer
accurately. In 1995, during a phone conversation with Dave
Hunt, we began to discuss a way to assess the specific fitness of our student
athletes. Before long, I was embarking on a project
gathering data to find an accurate formula to project the potential of sprinters
in the 100m, 200m and 400m races. By using various world and NCAA rankings,
U.S. high school state meet results, and Canadian high
school and club results as raw data, I attempted to accurately formulate a
simple equation to assess the relative Speed Endurance and Special Endurance
fitness of sprinters. This simple equation has value in enabling a coach to
assess quickly an athlete's race-specific fitness for a sprinting distance but
also to project the potential of an athlete based on his/her speed or speed
endurance component.

Definition of Terms: for all the
training terms please assume the athlete is running at
95-100%.Speed Endurance: 60-150
meters

Elite high school athlete: Any
high school aged athlete listed in the top 25 for his/her respective
countryWorld elite athlete: Any athlete listed in
the top 25 in the world

A simple formula
was devised by taking an athlete's best 200m time and dividing it by the
athlete's best 100m time-or an athlete's best 400 time and dividing it by his
best 200 time. In Figure 1 are a few examples of the
sprint specific fitness of various athletes from around the
world.

In a preliminary
search for trends Dave Hunt used the Canadian all-time rankings for women. He
found that women could expect the average quotients for the 100m and 200m to be
2.006 and for the 200 and 400 to be 2.22. This preliminary search only used ten
women, so more work had to be done. I set out to crunch
hundreds of numbers and find quotients that could be used to estimate
performances for other athletes. Because much of the high school results were
gathered from various state meets, this study did not take into consideration
the fatigue factor that occurs during the course of a meet The athletes used may
have been involved with relays or jumps that may affect the result of the
differentials. This study also did not take into account
the differences in body types, fiber types or training of all the individuals
studied. The study was limited to 100, 200 and 400 performances, as found in
various lists. To give more examples, I used world leaders
in an attempt to find how the best in the world handle the different sprinting
events. These are shown above, also in Figure 1. For
interest sake we can project how fast Michael Johnson may be able to run the 400
meters. If we use Michael's 1996 Olympic Trials to come up with a quotient the
result is: 43.44 seconds divided by 19.66 seconds = 2.209.
Now let's take Michael's world record 200 and multiply it by the 1996 Olympic
Trials quotient: 19.32 x 2.209 = 42.69 seconds! What this
preliminary information tells us is that, if Michael could have maintained his
Special Endurance 2 as demonstrated at the Olympic Trials, his projected
performances at the 1996 Olympics may have been even faster! In fact the 400
world record could have been lowered by more than a
half-second. The aspect of projecting where athletes true
potential may lie was so intriguing I began to tabulate hundreds of meet results
in pursuit of creating a reliable average quotient The result differed slightly
between the sexes, ages and levels of athletes.

The women's study revealed the best quotient for the
200 meters divided by the 100 meters to be 1.963 and the best 400 meters and 200
meters quotient to be 2.136. Both values were accomplished by Canadian
Juniors.

*This result is skewed slightly as a result of the
1992 and 1995 OntarioHigh
School Provincial Meets. These meets had
young men running 200 and 100 meters sub-2.00
differentials.

During the course of the men's study, it was not
unusual to come across values of 1.99 or lower with the 100 meters and 200
meters. The best men's 100 and 200 quotient was 1.959 (unless Michael
Johnson's 10.09 and 19.32 is used; then the best value
becomes 1.914). The best quotient the 200m and 400 was 2.152, accomplished by a
NCAA Division III athlete during the 1995/1996 campaign.
The results allow coaches to make rough estimates to how athletes might perform
in the various events. I now can make a rough estimate how a university woman
running 24.50 seconds might perform (with proper training) in the 400 meters.
Based on my findings I can estimate she will run 54.93 seconds for the 400
meters: 24.50 x 2.242 = 54.929. Although the concept and
formula for estimating the possible performances is quite simple, they may have
some far-reaching ramifications. Do faster 200m performances mean faster 400m
performances? Can we gauge how close an athlete is to peaking, based on the
differential between his 100 meters and 200 meters or 200m and 400times? If we
can raise the specific 400m fitness of a 20.10 200m sprinter will he be able to
run 44.22 seconds? If an athlete's quotient falls outside of the norms is the
athlete in the appropriate event? Is the athlete's training appropriate for the
requirements of the event? By using this simple formula,
we have been able to estimate future performances, make decisions on training
and gauge peaking of the athletes at our schools. Have fun with the formula and
try it out on your own athletes. You may find some surprising values. That
average 200m athlete may have the potential to be the next 400m world
champion.

Editor's
note: In Run With The Best, a book recently
published by Tafnews Press (Book Division of Track & Field News), the
authors, Tony Benson and Irv Ray, use this quotient concept, which they refer to
as Stamina Indicators, in predicting the potential of middle and long distance
runners in events they don't ordinarily run. To them, Stamina Indicators provide
an important index to the coach to determine whether the athlete needs to work
more on speed rather than endurance, or vice
versa.